Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Coptic Christians living in the United States have sent a letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton pleading for her to take more action to save their brethren in Egypt, as Egyptian Coptic Christians face increasing persecution and annihilation by the Egyptian army under the aegis of the Muslim Brotherhood.

Termed "a crime against humanity" the ongoing killings and arrests by the Egyptian Military Counsel are highlighted in a letter written by Monir A. Dawoud, President of the American Coptic Association. He reflects that on October 9, 2011, right after Clinton "expressed satisfaction with the performance of the Egyptian Military counsel, live ammunition was fired upon unarmed demonstrating Christians. More than 40 Christians were killed and more than 350 were seriously injured.

Dawoud expresses dismay with the American "official state declaration welcoming radicals" such as the Muslim Brotherhood. Dawoud writes that "[a]llowing [the] Muslim Brotherhood Group to control Egypt will definitely lead to the ultimate destruction of freedom and democracy not only in Egypt but all over the Arab countries and will spread to the rest of the world!"

Germany's biggest Catholic-owned publishing house has been rocked by disclosures that it has been selling thousands of pornographic novels...

The revelations made in the publishing-industry newsletter Buchreport concern Weltbild, a company with an annual €1.7bn (£1.5bn) turnover and 6,400 employees. It is Germany's largest bookseller after Amazon and wholly owned by the Catholic Church.

...Buchreport revealed that Weltbild's massive assortment of titles available to customers online includes some 2,500 "erotic" books...The publisher's website also pictures the titles' lascivious dust jackets that feature colour photographs of scantily clad women in high heels and erotic underwear.

But Bernhard Müller, editor of the Catholic magazine PUR, dismissed the clerics' reaction as grossly hypocritical. He alleged that the pornography scandal at Weltbild had been going on for at least a decade with the Church's full knowledge. Mr Müller said that in 2008, a group of concerned Catholics had sent bishops a 70-page document containing irrefutable evidence that Weltbild published books that promoted pornography, Satanism and magic. They demanded that the publisher withdraw the titles.